Help with KVM Switch

Roary on 06/08/2024 - 12:16

Hey all

After some advice about a KVM switch or other alternatives. here is my situation

At home I have a decent gaming setup. RTX 4080 and a couple of decent monitors (not sure what size. lets say 34 inch). I work from home 2.5 days per week and use this PC to connect to work.

Now my company has bought me a shiny new laptop and a dock which I will leave the dock at work. So I want to know what sort of KVM switch I need to buy for home.

The laptop connects to the dock using Thunderbolt 4. So I guess I need a KVM that supports that whilst my gaming PC has multiple monitors.

My questions are around the ethernet connection and headphones/mic. I would like to have my gaming PC always connected to the Internet and the laptop also stay connected when I switch over to the gaming PC during lunch breaks :) . Ideally, I don't want to plug ethernet (as well as Thunderbolt) to my laptop every time I want to use it. I don't think there is a way around this?

Any advice would be great. Thanks

Computing KVM Switch

Comments

  • Ronney on 06/08/2024 - 12:40
    +1

    Can’t you use WiFi when they are not docked & ethernet when they are docked?

    • Roary on 06/08/2024 - 14:24

      I do have wifi available but my PC doesnt have a wifi card.
      The laptop I will be taking to work and home but yes that can use wifi

  • littlejib on 06/08/2024 - 12:56

    I have a similar setup for my home office, though my laptop doesnt have a thunderbolt connection. For the audio part of that, it is very hard to find something to do audio between both. If you plan on having your main computer on at all times you can connect the two with VB-Audio Voicemeeter across the network. Set up an input on your main PC that connects to the output of your laptop and you will be able to hear your laptop sounds through your PC. I found this better than connection the audio through a little USB DAC.

    The best solution for that I found though was a GoXLR mini, it has a input and output port on it so that you can use your mic and headphones on either computer without the other having to be on. I wasn't able to find any other audio interfaces that did this.

    • Roary on 06/08/2024 - 14:23

      Thats over $300 for the GoXLR. My gaming PC does not have any speakers, I only use headphones. The laptop also I only need headphones for Teams calls. it would be far cheaper for me to buy a second pair of headphones

      • littlejib on 06/08/2024 - 14:42
        +1

        Oh for sure, I specifically wanted to be able to use both at once since I use my home PC to spin up work VMs. I also like the features of the GoXLR. I also have a good pair of headphones and a nice microphone and I didn't want to duplicate that purchase for the laptop, or buy a cheap set I had to change to.

  • TheFreaK on 06/08/2024 - 13:22
    +1

    The dock should have ethernet built into it no? Should be able to just buy a cheap as chips switch and run ethernet to the PC and the laptop dock, have the laptop connect to everything via the one USB-C cable

    • Roary on 06/08/2024 - 14:26

      I do not have a dock for the laptop at home. I want to use the laptops thunderbolt to connect to a KVM to share monitors, keyboard mouse headphones etc.

      • pinchies on 06/08/2024 - 14:33
        +1

        Everything thunderbolt is expensive FYI.

      • TheFreaK on 06/08/2024 - 14:52
        +1

        Best to get a dock for home to connect to said KVM, a thunderbolt KVM will cost you an arm and a leg and likely won't have great compatibility with your PC

  • ihfree on 06/08/2024 - 14:54
    +1

    I use a Thunderbolt dock for my laptop. I use a ugreen USB switch to change input devices.

    This Dock is attached to the HDMI inputs of my monitors and my PC is connected to the DP inputs.

    Switching involves pressing the button the USB switch and changing monitor inputs. Much of my desktop use outside of gaming is through remote desktop.

  • Broke-Ken on 06/08/2024 - 15:51
    +1

    Depends on your budget, but my advice is similar to ihfree's

    Firstly, check what dock you got that will be at work, if it's at a reasonable price, then get another one of those for home. Otherwise another alternative is the Dell DA300, can be gotten pretty cheap on ebay, you can connect multiple monitors, ethernet cable, and a USB switcher(Will get to this later) to it, and then only connect a single usb-c able to the laptop.

    Regarding the USB switcher, look at getting the Ugreen one with a button to switch where it's going, there are 2 I believe, the older version is cheaper. with this switch, plug in your keyboard, mouse, and a usb headset, can even plug in your webcam to it too, just don't connect any storage devices to it.

    The benefit of this set up is that you're able to use both computers at the same time, where as a KVM switch will only allow you to use one at a time.

  • Roary on 07/08/2024 - 01:03
    +1

    Thanks guys. Spoke to my boss. He said I can keep my desktop at work and use the dock and laptop exclusivity at home. So yer I will take the dock home and look at buying a USB switch for keyboard/mouse.

    Any reason why I shouldnt just buy the older version of this Ugreen switch? $100 budget is quite reasonable for the USB switch and I might need another DP cable.

    • Broke-Ken on 07/08/2024 - 15:46

      Any reason why I shouldnt just buy the older version of this Ugreen switch? $100 budget is quite reasonable for the USB switch

      $100 budget? Did you find one for that price? older version is currently only $44.99 on Amazon, or the new one is $69.99 on Amazon atm

      The old one works just fine for me, the new ones has some nice features, but not necessary. New one has faster data transfer speeds and uses USB-c connections, also the button to switch is separate to the main unit where you can position it closer to you, without the main unit and all the cables with it.

      • Broke-Ken on 07/08/2024 - 17:24

        Just found a better deal for the new one for $41.99, but it has a slower transfer speed of 5Gbps as opposed to 10Gbps.

  • djsweet on 07/08/2024 - 09:21
    +1

    I’ve been through this too. A current solution is to buy 2x Dell daisy-chain able thunderbolt monitors. Then you can connect your laptop with one cable and desktop via hdmi/dp/whatever. Dell U2724DE

  • CrowsZorro on 07/08/2024 - 10:36

    I currently use this one from Amazon for a dual screen set up. It's pretty good and works better than my last KVM that died. You could get a Bluetooth/wifi card for your PC though.

    8K Dual Monitor KVM Switch HDMI 8K@60Hz 4K@144Hz,Camgeet KVM Switch 2 Monitors 2 Computers with 4 USB 3.0 HUB for Keyboard Mouse Printer,Wired Remote,12V Power Adapter and USB Cables Included https://amzn.asia/d/90zN9L1

  • dude777 on 07/08/2024 - 18:07
    +2

    Figured I give my 2c as well since I had a similar situation. Gaming desktop + laptop. I don't need more than 1 screen when gaming and if I work, I use the laptop as a monitor to make my second monitor. Laptop is connected to a Dell WD19 dock - can be had for about $90 second hand.

    I use a USB switcher to switch my keyboard and mouse and a HDMI/DP cable is plugged into my monitor. Similar to others, I've had issues with audio, but I've managed around that by letting the laptop connect through bluetooth. Putting it through the USB switcher seemed to make a loud pop noise when I switched, so opted away from it. As OP is only using headset, you can put this through the switcher and see performance.

    To switch PCs, I just press the 1 button on the switcher and use controlmymonitor to change the input with autohotkey (my shortcut is ctrl + alt + 1/2/0 - 1 is for PC1, 2 is for PC2 and 0 is to turn off). This way I don't have to fumble and change the inputs through the joystick at the back of my monitor. If you can't install software on your work laptop, install it on your desktop and have both hotkey setups to switch between PC1 and PC2. Also if you're using 2 monitors, I can't seem to see why you can't use a hotkey to change 2 monitors at once.

    KVMs are good hardware solution, but when I was looking around, it seemed like it was difficult to find the features I wanted at an affordable price.

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